Modern science comes from the former Austria-Hungary (or the Austro-Hungarian Dual Monarchy). Don’t just think of Freud. The Vienna Circle was the most influential group in the history of logic and philosophy, but there were numerous “Kreis” in Vienna. Karl Menger’s Mathematical Colloquium, or the Austrian School of Economics, but don’t forget other parts of the Empire. The Lwów–Warsaw School formed in Galicia, and Budapest was the birth place of several mathematical geniuses like John von Neumann, Paul Erdős and etc. David Edmonds’ fantastic book tells the story of the vibrant Vienna, the rise of the circle and how it is transplanted into the Anglo-Saxon world right before WW2. It is not a philosophy/logic book, although it explains the basic ideas of the Cricle (or its members), but it is rather a book on the history of ideas.

Most of us think of the Vienna Circle as a synonym of neo-positivism and we’d like to think we can describe the whole movement with a few sentences. Also, most of us think of the Circle as a very technical movement, dealing only with logic and (formal) epistemology. Edmonds shows us that members of the Circle had got very different views on logic, language, science and the role of philosophy. Some of them, like Gödel, took a very formal, mathematical stance. Others, like Neurath, were more interested in social sciences and the use of the modern science for advancing society. The Circle cooperated with the Bauhaus school, Otto Neurath was the guy behind the ISOTYPE movement, a very opinionated grammar of graphics for data visualization.

The funniest thing about the Vienna Circle its relation to Wittgenstein. They loved the Tractatus and of them (Waismann) devoted half of his academic career to explain it. But Wittgenstein wasn’t very keen on being the messiah of the Circle and he left Vienna for Cambridge.

The rise of the Nazis meant the end of the vibrant Viennese scientific and cultural life. Luckily, the Circle had got very good international connections so most of its members can escape from Austria (and Germany after the Anschluss). Members of the Circle (and people associated with it, like Karl Popper) got positions at American and English institutions. Neurath arrived to England after the occupation of the Netherlands via a stolen boat. Béla Juhos and Victor Kraft were remained in Vienna during WW2. After WW2, the members of the Circle assimilated to the Anglo-Saxon world. Although they stayed in touched, everyone started working on his own line and we cannot speak about a common shared background anymore. The legacy of the Circle is unquestionable. Carnap’s work on the foundations of probability, Popper’s falsification theory or Gödel’s theorems are part of the everyday scientific discussion. It’s worth reading Edmonds’ lovely book on this story, maybe we can learn the lessons and history won’t repeat itself again.

The header image was downloaded from this link: http://isotyperevisited.org/2009/09/modern-man-in-the-making.html